Martuska
by Brunette
Summary: Beni wasn't helpless. He might have been scrawny and weak and shifty, but he'd never been helpless. He was too determined and resourceful to be helpless. He was too good of a pick-pocket. He spoke too many languages. And his eyes were too sad. Beni wasn't helpless. But she was. [one-shot]


_**Author's Note. **I know, I'm pretty much the one-shot machine anymore. I keep wanting to update 1925 but I THINK it's going to be an Ardeth chapter next, and screw that guy. So...here's this instead._

**_Disclaimer._**_ The characters of The Mummy are the property of Universal Studios._

**_Martuska_**_ is, I believe, pronounced /mar-TOOSH-kah/ Correct me if I'm wrong, people who know Hungarian!_

* * *

**Martuska**

He didn't put up with Beni because he liked him.

He didn't even really put up with him because he felt sorry for him, though he supposed he pitied him now and then. He'd always pitied weaklings. Maybe it was from growing up in the orphanage, the one big kid in the midst of a dozen skinny-legged Arabs. He'd been standing up for shrimps like Beni for as long as he could remember. He'd protected a lot of kids who couldn't defend themselves, and in his way, Beni reminded him of them.

Except that he didn't. The orphans he grew up with were actually pretty helpless. But Beni wasn't helpless. He might have been scrawny and weak and shifty, but he'd never been helpless. He was too determined and resourceful to be helpless. He was too good of a pick-pocket. He spoke too many languages. And his eyes were too sad. Beni wasn't helpless.

But she was.

That's really who it came down to, though he supposed he'd been putting up with Beni before he met her. He'd been putting up with Beni even though he stole his food and spare change. He put up with him because no one else was going to, and even if he deserved it, Rick just didn't have the heart to watch the same guy get picked on and pummeled every day. The Legion was hard, and Beni wasn't. He was prey and he knew it, and when Rick extended his protection, he latched onto him like a leech.

Eventually he might have cut Beni loose, though. The more he learned about him, the more he realized that Beni could handle himself. That Beni _did_ handle himself, and that he was only hanging around Rick because it was easier than talking his way out of trouble. He stopped feeling sorry for Beni after a while, and he might have cut him loose. Beni was alone and he made his own way, and he wasn't interested in friends. So Rick had been as skeptical as anyone when Beni told them one night around the campfire:

"I have a wife."

"Sure you do."

They'd all laughed. Rick had laughed, too, though he tried to hide it in a snort. Beni was a liar and a fairly bad one at that, and no one would ever believe he was married.

"I do."

"Uh-huh. What's her name?"

"Martuska."

"That doesn't even sound like a real name."

"It's Hungarian, idiot."

"Don't call me an idiot, you slimy little bastard!"

"Hey, hey. Easy there, Philippe."

"Stay out of it, O'Connell! You know as well as anyone he is lying. Who would marry him?"

Martuska would.

She would and she did, when she was sixteen and he was nineteen. Sometimes Rick tried to imagine her on her wedding day, a rosy teenager with dark hair and darker eyes. He tried to imagine her that way instead of the way she was when he met her on a strange, warm night in Algeria. He tried to imagine her in white.

She was wearing a brown dress in Algeria. Maybe it was a kind of dark red or orange, and just dirty. But it looked brown; a kind of grimy brown that clung to her like a layer of dust. Her skin was clean but the dress was not. That's what he remembered.

He remembered the old, faded brown dress and her wide, dark eyes. He remembered her hair hung down her shoulders and was tangled from the wind. And he remembered thinking something about her was pretty, or at least prettier than he expected.

She wasn't pretty, at least not in the usual way. When Rick pictured beauty, he saw full red lips and bobbed blonde curls. He saw white smiles and painted fingernails and dangerous necklines. Martuska didn't have any of that. Her features were fairly ordinary and absolutely un-glamorous. She didn't wear make-up and her hair and dress were both too long.

But she was pretty. At least too pretty for Beni. He distinctly remembered thinking so.

He and Beni had been walking down the street headed nowhere in particular - probably to a bar - and there she was leaning against a nondescript building on a nondescript street. Smoking a cigarette. She saw them and said something Rick couldn't understand, but Beni stopped all the sudden, and his face became pale, and the next thing Rick knew, he was standing awkwardly off to the side while the two of them jabbered in rapid Hungarian, in tones he couldn't decipher as angry or just weary.

He saw the dull brass ring on her finger and knew who she was.

He watched them because he wasn't sure what else to do, or perhaps he just didn't want to do anything else. He might have gone onto the bar...he should have gone on to the bar. But he couldn't glance away from Martuska, even when her eyes would flit over to his curiously. He couldn't glance away.

She stood there twisting the ring on her finger anxiously, staring up at Beni with her wide and desperate eyes. Her lips kept flexing and jerking, like she was doing her very best not to cry, and when he said something to her, she muttered in response. She'd look at her feet and push the hair out of her eyes. She'd sigh and stare down the road, and blink away tears.

And all the while Beni talked, fast and whiny at the same time, some kind of caricature of helplessness. But Rick saw...he'd already seen. Beni wasn't helpless, but Martuska was, murmuring Hungarian words with her trembling lips, shaking her head and touching her temples in something like exhaustion. She stared up at him, so hopeless and wanting, and Rick started to feel like Beni was using the same words and phrases over again.

He saw Beni put a hand on her shoulder, and he saw her stiffen. He saw how she wanted to flinch away, but didn't. And then Beni said something else, and she couldn't hold back a sob any longer. She wrapped her arms around him and kissed his face and Beni told Rick he wouldn't be going to the bar.

Rick didn't see him again until almost a whole day later, dozing on his cot when Rick returned from the mess hall.

"So that was her, huh?"

Beni woke with a start, bolting upright as he was prone to do. He looked at Rick with wild eyes for a moment before acclimating to his surroundings.

"What?"

"Martuska. That was her."

Beni frowned. "Of course it was Martuska."

"What's she doing in Algeria?"

Beni just snorted. "How the hell would I know?"

Rick raised his eyebrows skeptically. "You don't know why your wife is in Algeria?"

"Obviously she came looking for me."

"Okay..."

Beni let out a sigh and settled himself back down on his cot. He said, much too casually, "Her father wants to annul the marriage."

Rick's eyes widened. "So what's that mean?"

Beni snickered, joyfully condescending. "It makes it so that the marriage never happened. It can be done for couples who have never slept together, though that is _obviously_ not the case for us - "

"I know what an annulment is, Beni. I'm Catholic."

Beni raised his eyebrows, and Rick just shrugged stiffly.

"You know...kinda."

Beni chuckled and closed his eyes.

"Are you gonna do it?"

Without even opening his eyes, "Do what?"

"Get an annulment."

Beni frowned, and he glared up at the ceiling. "I don't know...what do you care?"

"I don't care."

"Well you keep asking me about Martuska."

Rick suddenly felt self-conscious, which was rare for him in the presence of Beni. Thieving, unscrupulous Beni could rarely make him feel guilty or uncomfortable about anything.

"I don't know..." Rick said, scratching the back of his neck. "You know, a lot of us didn't even think she was real."

Beni let out a bitter snort. "Well now you can go and tell everyone she is real."

Rick let out a sigh, staring at Beni there on the cot for a moment. Beni kept eyeing him darkly, making obvious glances towards the door. Rick knew he wanted him to leave, but he couldn't blink away the memory of Martuska there in the street, in her dress. He couldn't shake off her glistening, helpless eyes.

"What's she gonna do now that she's here? Does she have enough money to get back home?"

Beni sighed tersely, shooting him a look. "If she got herself here she can get herself back."

Rick's whole body tightened with anger, and he wasn't sure why.

"What's the story here, anyway?" he demanded.

Beni's brow furrowed up, and he instantly looked frightened and skittish at Rick's harsh tone. Rick regretted it, and he sat there stewing over his mistake, half-listening to Beni whine a sob story about his deep love for Martuska and his desperate stealing just to keep food on their table. Rick knew it was nothing but a big, flimsy lie. He wondered if he'd ever know the truth.

At night he laid awake and remembered Martuska, the color of her dress and her eyes. He remembered the way she stiffened at Beni's touch, and the way her lips formed sorrowful words he couldn't understand. He remembered her nervously puffing on her cigarette while Beni explained something to her with lies, and he remembered the way she held him close after he'd managed to say the right one. He remembered the way she kissed him and wondered if she loved him. If anyone could love him at all.

They left Algeria and marched on to Libya, and Rick didn't ask about Martuska even though he wanted to. Even though she was on his mind, always on his mind in her brown dress. He hoped that she made her way back to Hungary. He hoped that she got her annulment.

"Where were you all last night, Philippe?"

"Out with your 'wife,' Gabor."

They were in the mess hall and Rick was startled away from his breakfast at that mention of her, sarcastic though it was. He was startled out of his breakfast and back into that vivid memory of a quiet night and whispered foreign words, drowning out the loud guffawing of the men all around him. He glanced over at Beni and gave him a nudge, and tried to sound casual when he asked:

"Did she go back to her family?"

Beni just glared down at his plate. "No. She is waiting for me in Algeria."

"You don't sound too pleased about that."

"What the hell is she going to do in Algeria?" Beni grumbled. "She can't speak French or Arabic."

Rick just shrugged and said awkwardly, "Well, seems like she really cares about you."

Beni scoffed. "She does not care about me. She is just too scared of her father to go back home." He shoveled a forkful of food into his mouth, and Rick was only just able to hear him when he muttered, "He thinks if she marries someone else she will have children, but _I_ am not the problem here."

It came out slowly, in tantalizing bits when Rick was paying enough attention. Every now and then, Beni would say something, sometimes only to himself, and Rick could fit another piece of the truth together. Sometimes if he drank enough vodka, he'd tell a rambling story about her.

They'd gotten married as teenagers because Martuska was pregnant. Or at least, she thought she was. Beni hadn't been courting her; not many girls had much interest in him, between his looks and his disposition and his abysmal family situation. He was with a group of teenagers and Martuska was there, and they'd stolen some liquor and they were drinking and dancing. And Martuska let him kiss her. She let him steal her away to a private little hallway. She let him.

And she thought she was pregnant, so her father made them get married. It took several months for them to figure out she wasn't pregnant, and never had been. Her period had stopped and it wouldn't come back...but nothing else changed. There was no child. Perhaps there never would be.

All the while Beni stole and went to prison, and stole and went to prison, and somehow they were married ten years. Somehow they were married, even though he was in prison and then drifting across Europe and then in the French Foreign Legion. And somehow she kept waiting for him, perhaps because she was a good Catholic girl. She kept waiting for him and she was waiting for him now.

And when Rick thought about Martuska waiting for Beni...always waiting even though she shouldn't have, something inside him felt sad and tense. He found himself wanting Beni to go back to her, even though he knew Beni was a worthless husband; even though he knew Beni was a worthless man. Maybe he just didn't want all her waiting to be in vain. And even though he was sick of Beni, he protected him. He protected him for _her_.

Maybe someday he'd see what he had and go back to her.

People change.

Maybe Beni would change.

"You should go back to Algeria. Hamunaptra probably isn't real, and we don't even have orders."

Beni glared at him fiercely. "I am going to Hamunaptra."

Rick sighed. Sometimes he thought about going to Algeria. He didn't know why. But sometimes he thought about going there, and finding Martuska, and finding some way to tell her that Beni was dead. She needed that lie.

But Rick marched out with the rest of them, towards the promise of Hamunaptra. He marched out even though he knew it was foolish and they would probably get lost. He marched out and wished all the while he'd gone to Algeria. He wished he'd told Martuska Beni was dead, and given her a little money so she could buy a dress that wasn't brown.

And when they found nothing but blood and disappointment at Hamunaptra, and Rick finally made his way back to Cairo, he still thought about going to Algeria. Instead he went to the local Legion post and discharged.

"And you say everyone in your garrison died?"

"Every last one."

The secretary let out a sigh. "That's going to be a lot of paperwork on my end...tracking down relatives - "

Rick's eyes widened, and before he could stop himself, he was blurting, "I know where one of them is. Martuska Gabor - she's in Algiers - "

"Alright - "

"Was he gonna get any kind of penchant?"

"I don't know - "

"Give it to her, she needs it."

Rick didn't know if Beni had survived or not. He didn't know, but he felt relieved at the thought of Martuska getting his money - at the thought of her hearing that he had died and she was free. Sometimes he pictured her in a new, stylish red dress with her hair cut. He pictured her with rouge and a carefree expression, staying at a clean but humble hotel. He pictured here standing in front of the mirror and noticing her hands, and slowly...carefully, taking that pathetic brass ring off of her finger, leaving it on the nightstand with a tip for the maid.

Other times he pictured her just the same, dressed just the same and looking just the same, sitting on the curb of that forgotten street in Algiers and crying. He always tried to shrug off that thought, though it was more vivid and pervasive than the other. He always tried to shrug it off and think of her wearing red.

She would have looked nice in red.

It was months before he saw Beni again, hunched over on a barstool drinking vodka. It was the vodka order that tipped him off. He looked up and there at the other end of the crowded bar was Beni. His whole body tensed with anger, and thoughts of giving the man a good beating filled his mind. He thought for a fleeting moment about firing a shot right in his chest...and then suddenly, almost against his will, he thought of Martuska.

"Headed back to Algiers?"

"Why the hell would I - O-O'Connell! What a surprise!"

Beni twitched on the barstool, his eyes flitting between Rick's burning glare and the barkeep. He gulped hard and offered him a guilty smile.

"How fortunate that you have survived, my friend! God has truly blessed you!"

Rick wanted to pummel him. He wanted to knock out his front teeth. After all he'd done for Beni, the little coward would leave him to die in Hamunaptra? He ought to kill him.

"I _said,_ are you headed back to Algiers?"

Beni blinked in perplexity before realization dawned on him, and his eyes filled with the falsest kind of sorrow. "Oh, my friend, how I long to return to Algiers and to the loving arms of my wife. But alas, I barely have enough money to keep myself fed..."

Rick knew Beni wouldn't go back to Algiers, at least not in search of Martuska. And he knew with any luck Martuska wasn't there, anyway. Maybe she'd gone back to Hungary and married a decent man. Maybe she'd managed to have a baby, after all. Maybe she'd cut her hair and wore red. When he'd seen her stiffen at his touch, he knew she could have.

But other times, more frequently, he remembered that desperate kind of hopefulness in her eyes just before she wrapped her arms around him. Just before she kissed him. Other times he remembered her nervously puffing in her cigarette in a faded dress, foreign and frightened and helpless, waiting for a husband who wasn't going to come back.

He thought of her waiting there for reasons he couldn't understand, and he could never bring himself to give Beni what he really deserved. He knew she was foolish to wait there for him, or perhaps just out of options. Maybe he was the foolish one, determined to believe that someday Beni _would_ go back.

She probably wasn't even in Algeria anymore.

He just couldn't shove off the memory of her in her dress, waiting in Algiers. He couldn't forget her standing there so helpless and nervous, desperately needing someone to protect her. He was protective by nature.

"I told the Legion you died."

"Oh?" His face split into a grin. "Well, thank you. I had another five years on that damned sentence."

"They told Martuska. At least...I told them to."

Beni blinked hard, staring at Rick in confusion. "You told them to tell my wife I died?"

Rick shifted his weight and glanced into his whiskey. "Yeah."

Beni murmured something to himself, probably in Hungarian, and before Rick could stop himself, he gave him a nudge.

"What was that?"

Beni's hand flexed on his glass, and he shrugged stiffly. "I said that was easier than an annulment." But his voice was strange and hollow. "It does not matter. She did not want to marry me, anyway."

"She was waiting for you in Algeria."

"Well she is not waiting anymore, now, is she?"

Rick didn't know. He didn't know which Martuska to believe in. He wanted to think she was happily wearing red, but a part of him knew that that version of Martuska would have freed herself of Beni a long time ago. That Martuska wouldn't have come all the way to Algeria in the vain hope of finding her criminal lowlife husband instead of just annulling the marriage. She wouldn't have waited for him while he marched out to Libya.

He wouldn't have felt obligated to spare Beni on behalf of that Martuska.

The real one was there in Algiers, in her faded brown dress, waiting for Beni because she was terrified of her father. And Rick never could quite forget her, even if Beni could.

**end.**


End file.
